two things on their own and both at once
by Cerberusia
Summary: 'After NEWTS are over, Albus comes back to Hogwarts.' Snapshots of a friendship which might very well be romantic. AS/S


**Prompt:** Piercing, scarf, Malfoy heirloom of some sort

**Notes:** The two poems quoted are 'My father thought it bloody queer' by Simon Armitage, and (the beginning of the second stanza of) Keats' 'Lamia'. The title is from 'Homecoming', also by Simon Armitage, because I am pretentious and _why not_.

* * *

><p>After NEWTs are over, Albus comes back to Hogwarts. They're allowed to do that; the summer term isn't over yet, so the school is still technically open to them. He comes to say goodbye to the teachers, to the portraits, to this place where he's spent seven years of his life. Some might say the best years, but it's maudlin to think of the entire prime of his life being over and done with by the time he's seventeen. He'd rather look to the future.<p>

But before he can move on, out in the world of jobs and maturity and independence, he has to come back here one last time.

So first, he goes down to the dungeons. The common room is deserted, but otherwise the same as it was the last time he saw it: black leather and dark wood, the orb lamps casting green circles of light on the walls and tables. It smells a little damp, as always, and because it's the height of summer it's also warm and rather humid; students tend to cast Air-Clearing Charms to make it more bearable. Albus doesn't bother.

He goes up to the boys' dormitory for a while to lie down on his bed, spread-eagled, and stare at the green velvet hangings. He'll never sleep here again. He closes his eyes for a moment, and inhales the smell of whatever soap it is that the house-elves use on the bedclothes.

He doesn't know how long he lies there for - he might have drifted off at some point - but when he sits up again the room looks different, like a painting viewed through a filter; all the colours have shifted. He blinks, but it doesn't go away. It's probably just the light.

Then he has to go all the way up to the fifth floor, up the spiral staircase and talk to the eagle. She knows him as well as her own by now but, suspicious as ever, she still demands he pass her test. It's an easy one, though: the traditional Sphinx's riddle, and Albus was taught to read on Egyptian myths.

The door opens, and Albus knows immediately that Scorpius isn't here.

He checks, just to make sure: the common room, the dormitory - even the girls' dorm, because Scorpius would think it was funny to make Albus struggle with the staircase. He's in none of those places - but there's an open window in the boy's dorm, and Albus knows it's a trail.

He sticks his head out of the window, looks down, and is immediately hit with vertigo. He closes his eyes. He's fine on a broom, but for some reason is otherwise rather shaky when confronted with steep drops. He looks to the right and to the left, and find nothing. This leaves up.

And indeed, when he looks up he finds handholds worn into the stone, leading up to the roof. He takes several deep breaths, curses Scorpius viciously in his head, and begins to lever himself out of the window.

It's not actually that bad; the stone feels firm, and he very deliberately does _not_ look down. He reaches his destination within a minute: a flat area wedged between the roof, a smaller turret and a gable. It's not very big - there's maybe enough room for two slender people stood close together - and it's already occupied.

"I was thinking about burying it," Scorpius says after Albus has hung there for what feels like a minute. "Leaving a piece of me behind, here where no-one will look." He keeps fiddling with a small silver ring; delicate and filigreed, and occasionally a tiny crystal winks in the sun.

His elbows on the parapet, Albus wrinkles his nose. "That's awfully sentimental, Scorp."

"Scorpius," comes the automatic correction.

"Scorp, Scorpius, whatever. Also, it's not really 'burying'."

"Embedding, then. Whatever you want to call it." Scorpius' eyes are still downcast. Despite it being a sweltering summer, it's still cold up here, and Albus is grateful for his heavy robes. Scorpius, ever prepared, is wearing a scarf - Albus' house scarf, in fact. He resolves to nick it back at the first opportunity.

"You're mad," says Albus, matter of fact, but Scorpius just shrugs. The wind catches his hair, and Albus catches a flash of silver in his left ear - the only one he can see, in fact, because Scorpius still isn't facing him.

"Oi, whassis?" he says, and this time Scorpius looks up just long enough - ah, they're in both lobes - to see Albus gesture to his ear before he drops his eyes to the stone again.

"It's traditional." Still turning the ring over and over.

"What, you did it 'cos you were told to?" As far as Albus knows, Scorpius is not accustomed to doing what he's told. The earrings are quite nice, though, as these things go - silver, with small blue stones which are indubitably real sapphires. Not gaudy; understated, tasteful. Typical Malfoy.

Scorpius presses his lips together his eyes slide away.

"_If that's how easily you're led, you should've had it through your nose instead_," says Albus, trying for knowledgeable but knowing pretentious is more likely. It does get Scorpius to look up, though. The tip of his nose is slightly pink from the cold.

"...Sorry, what?" asks Scorpius, and Albus shrugs.

"Some poem. Muggle. Modern," he adds, seeing Scorpius' squint. "I know you prefer Keats."

_"She was a gordian shape of dazzling hue..."_ Scorpius recites, trailing off dreamily. Albus resists the urge to roll his eyes. He likes poetry alright, but he can't understand Scorpius' apparent obsession with it. "Anyway, I wasn't 'led' - I wanted it done."

Albus shrugs. "S'pose it looks alright," he concedes, and Scorpius nods, satisfied.

There's another long pause in the conversation.

"S'freezing up here," says Albus. "Come on, let's stop being pretentious and go back inside."

Scorpius breathes out mist in a heavy sigh, then says:

"Yeah, okay."

(Albus goes home with the thought of Scorpius' long, pale fingers in his mind. He sneaks into his mother's room and borrows her jewelery box. He takes out the rings and earrings and sets them on the windowsill to watch them sparkle in the play of sunlight.)

Two months later, they're both back on the roof.

"Can't believe I let you drag me up here," says Albus, hugging his knees to his chest. "Isn't this supposed to be summer?"

"British summer," Scorpius reminds him, and Albus snorts. They're both sat on the flat bit this time, squished together by the turrets. Scorpius doesn't seem to mind, and Albus definitely doesn't - sharing body heat, and all that. Scorpius is a warm line from his shoulder to his knee.

"How's the 'preliminary reading' going?" asks Albus after a moment of silence. Scorpius shrugs, the movement drawing attention to his earrings - still silver, but this time the gems are green. "Hey, you've got new earrings," he adds.

"They're alexandrite. It's fine, I suppose," says Scorpius dissmissively. "I've encountered very little so far that I didn't already know." He tilts his head to squint into the sky. "It's all interesting, though. You should really have done Classical Studies, you know - you were good at it, and I know you used to enjoy it."

"It was fun," admits Albus, "I just wanted to do Arithmancy more, I guess." He doesn't add that although he did like Ancient Runes, his favourite part was getting to see Scorpius. It's true, but a bit sappy.

"Classical Studies and Arithmancy - was there ever a more mismatched pair?" muses Scorpius.

"Is that a bastardised quote from _Romeo and Juliet_?" asks Albus.

"Um," says Scorpius. "Possibly?" Albus just shakes his head.

"I don't know how you can quote half of the Illiad of by heart, but not know more than the most baisc Shakespeare. Seriously, how does that work?" Scorpius shrugs yet again.

"I do _like_ Shakespeare - he just doesn't speak to me like Homer does."

Albus has no reply to that.

(Albus goes home, digs out his copy of The Illiad and reads it the whole way through. Then he takes down Romeo and Juliet from the shelf, and does the same. For some reason, all the characters have blond hair.)

That December, they're up there again.

"I'm getting deja vu," Albus remarks, hauling himself up for the third time. Scorpius just shifts over. He looks different today - tired, washed out. They sit in silence for a long moment.

"Your dad...?" asks Albus at last. Scorpius nods.

Albus worms his arm from out between them and wraps it around Scorpius' thin shoulders, pulling him in. Scorpius' mouth twists, and for a moment he looks dangerously close to tears, but he blinks twice, rapidly, and his composure returns.

"...It's just so _ridiculous_," he says, leaning against Albus. "What does he have to do before they stop hounding him?"

Albus knows that he doesn't have to answer that, so instead he hums a couple of bars of 'Blowin' In the Wind'. His voice is nothing special, but he can at least keep on key and in tune - which is better than his father, who can't carry a tune in a bucket. He hears Scorpius sigh heavily and feels him relax, a pleasant weight against his chest. They breathe in harmony.

(Albus goes home with Scorpius to the Manor. They wander the halls panelled with dark wood, because Albus never gets tired of exploring. Then they rifle through Scorpius' jewelery box (which he insists is a perfectly masculine thing to have) and dig out the rings and earrings and bracelets and necklaces and try them on like children playing dress-up, laughing. Then they curl up together on Scorpius' - ridiculously huge - bed and read iThe Illiad/i, with Scorpius pointing out all the implications and double-meanings and Albus relating it to every novel he's ever studied just to see Scorpius look confused.

They fall asleep like that; like puppies, curled into one another. Albus is dark and Scorpius is fair, but even so it would be difficult to know where one begins and one ends - if, indeed, they end at all.)


End file.
